This week, a little more on managing digital photos XP SP3 is almost here --- they really mean it this time one less annoyance in Vista, and what's not to like about that?

Find duplicate photos

Last week's column about managing digital photos

Managing digital photos

really got people's attention. Several readers and clients wanted to know if there was an easy way to find and eliminate duplicate photos.

There are lots of ways to do this, and some are easier than others. I know of two free programs that are good at finding duplicates. Dup Detector is specifically for the purpose of finding and allowing you to delete photos. It is thorough, and works happily in the background while you do something else. If you take the time to look through the help file, it is reasonably easy to use. If you don't, the interface is just plain confusing. Dup Detector will work on anything from Windows 95 to XP. Sorry, no Vista. Once you figure it out, Dup Detector works great. You can read more about it and grab it here:

Dup Detector

Another tool is Duplicate Cleaner, available here:

Duplicate Cleaner

Also free, it found everything Dup Detector did on my hard drive, and took less time. Duplicate Cleaner can also find duplicates of other kinds of files, not just photos. I had a go at my mp3's and it found a ton of duplicates there, too. I thought the interface was more helpful than Dup Detector, but either tool is worth a look.

Whatever method you use to find and eliminate your duplicate files, please be careful that they are, in fact, duplicates and that you kill off the correct one. If you're not sure what you're doing, get some help before you proceed.

XP SP3 is almost here

Microsoft announced that Service Pack 3 for Windows XP will be available to the public on April 29. It will be part of Windows Update by early June.

By all accounts, XP3 is not heavy on enhancements. Instead it is described as being chiefly a roll up of all the patches and security updates that have come before. There are apparently no major improvements from SP2 which was released three years ago.

Nonetheless, it's a big download! And you can expect it to take some time to install. Check out the slide show here:



to see what you can expect. For more information about what is and is not included, see Paul Thurrott's excellent article here:

Paul Thurrott's article

Vista's "Blocked Programs" message annoys

Faithful reader Gord wrote in to ask how to turn off that annoying "reminder in Vista telling me that I have blocked programs in my start up, after all I did it on purpose so I don't need to be reminded!!"

Here are the steps:

Right-click on the annoying icon in the system tray

Select "Run blocked program"

Select "System Configuration utility"

Select "Continue" at the User Account Control prompt

Check the box that says "Don't show this message or start System

Configuration when Windows starts"

OK your way out

That should do it. (Thanks and a tip of the hat to The How-To Geek.)

Thank you everyone who emailed with questions, comments, and words of encouragement. You can reach me at cate@rlis.com if you have anything to ask or tell about your computer. Don't forget, you can browse the column archives at any time. Point your browser here:

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